Back to BABBO

After a long hiatus of about three years, I returned to Babbo, Mario Batali's flagship Italian restaurant on Waverly Street in Greenwich Village. Busy and buzzing as always. Had a short wait at the bar, and got a table upstairs in the main dining room.

The menu is essentially the same since I first started going, with many of the signature dishes that made Babbo's reputation still being served. There are nightly specials, but I have always loved the pasta dishes, particularly the famous beef cheek ravioli.

Last night, I ordered two courses: Mint Love Letters (covered in a lamb ragu) and the Barbecued Skirt Steak with Eggplant and Salsa Verda. The Love Letters dish is essentially ravioli stuffed with fresh mint and covered with sauce. A good portion, and though the pasta was tasty and refreshing, the ragu was pretty unremarkable.The steak was beautiful, perfect medium rare, and complemented with a delicious salsa verda. No complaints. $28. My dining companion was not so fortunate. Her Warm Lamb's Tongue Vinaigrette was topped with a three-minute egg that should have been hot, or warm. It was neither, and it went back to the kitchen and off the bill. Her main course was Spaghettini with Lobster; a generous serving of lobster chunks over pasta with a light red sauce. Seemed pretty tasty to me, but companion was unimpressed.

A nice surprise on the wine list: Savuto Odoardi 2005 for $35. Delicious Italian blend (mostly Aglianico) from Calabria that I discovered at another Batali outpost, Lupa, and have been drinking at home lately. $15 retail at most NYC wine stores.

Finally, the service was a genuine disaster. No sommelier came to the table. A waiter arrived about ten minutes after we had been seated and the busboy had given us the menus. We had to wave at the floor manager to take our order, after sitting with our menus closed for far too long. Generally, what I observed was a very amateurish operation. Seemed like every table was waiting for something, and at a table nearby we witnessed a waiter spilled sauce on a woman's dress as he picked up her plate. She was not pleased. So we skipped dessert, and left for a nightcap at the bar downstairs.

Two more things about this place. First, getting a dinner reservation in a reasonable time slot is virtually impossible. You need to call thirty days in advance to the day, and then hope for something other than 5:30pm or 10:30pm. Is it worth the hassle, this silly game Babbo has played for ten years? I think not. Second, it occurred to me that Babbo's moment has passed. The crowd was older, the music more timid, and the staff uninterested. I think our lady bartender was medicated, or stoned, because she was clearly out of it. Coincindentally, the general manager of Babbo, Colum, is an acquaintance, and he joined us at the bar while we sipped our after-dinner drinks (Jameson and a Chianti). We talked of other things; not our dinner or the service, or anything related to the restaurant. Probably should have said something, lest he wonder why we never came back.